Evilrooster

No frozen ground-swell damages my wall,
And all the warrens have been hunted out.
My neighbor's apples withered in the drought,
While since the fire I've got no pines at all.
What woods are left are never filled with snow,
Nor crossed by grassy paths just wanting wear.
I seldom stop; the thought that strikes me there
Is how I rue that no more hemlocks grow.
Some say the world will end in fire, while some
In water that erodes the shore defense.
From what I've seen so far of man's good sense,
I doubt it matters much. The end will come.
So all our wealth and words will wash away
Or burn to ash. For nothing gold can stay.

(Originally posted on a thread on climate change on Making Light)

"Chop wood, carry water, pray" is a descriptor of practical religious practice that appeals to me quite strongly.

"O fire-feeding corpse of fallen tree,
Which now my granite-sharpened axe doth hew
(And may it cut like Justice, straight and true):
I praise thy Maker as I'm chopping thee."
"O swiftly-flowing water, bright and clear,
Containéd in my pot like Grace once poured
Into a human soul by our dear Lord:
May thou be twice as sweet, though half as dear."
The bell for Vespers rings. I calmly kneel,
Not praying, really, just inventing praise.
But then the silence comes, and phrase by phrase
Reclaims my wasted words, and makes them real.
And thus the evening justifies the day:
I learn to chop wood, carry water, pray.

I posted this a while ago on Making Light, but somehow missed it in my mass transfer of sonnets to LJ. Found myself looking for it the other day, so here it is in my archive.

A sonnet on Google Wave.

The sea has depths in which no net is cast,
With trackless kelpine forests where great squid,
Like Sasquatch in his mountains safely hid,
Dance dreaming with the fishes swimming past.
And human interaction is the same.
Beneath an email surface lies the deep:
Unmodeled work and social patterns creep
And spread in ways existing tools don't frame.
If all that data made a single stream
(Instead of tossing users to and fro
Among their applications), it could flow
To ever-mounting heights: Hokusai's dream.
It sounds like fun. I must confess I crave
To grab a board and surf the Google wave.

Originally posted on Making Light.

The elder dragon stirs atop his hoard
And wakens, stretching out his scaly wings,
Rejoicing in the state of having things:
Possessions are, for him, their own reward.
He tallies up his silver and his gold,
Recalls the provenance of every gem,
But never feels the need to alter them:
He wasn't born to make, but just to hold.
But we are not the same: we crave the new.
We strive to tell, to write, to sing, to build
Until the space around us is all filled
And still we carry on. It's what we do.
But even we, when overwhelmed with stuff,
Must tidy up at times. Enough's enough!


Originally posted on Making Light.

The map said "Here be dragons" on the edge,
Beyond the farthest land, in open sea.
It seemed a little strange, at least to me:
Where did they build their nests? I like a ledge,
Some rocky outcrop on which I can sleep,
And hoard my gold, and dream up riddling quips
For jewel-thieves. I don't need much: just tips
Of stone between me and the chilly deep.
But I need dragons, too. I've been alone
For centuries. I want to rut, to breed,
To see my hatchlings on the wing. I need
A dragoness more than I need warm stone.
I searched for days, but all I found was sea.
Yet still the map is right, for here be me.


Originally posted on Making Light.

Above the thunder-clouds it hovers high,
Its skeletal ribs lit by lightning storms,
While rags of fabric trail in ghostly forms:
A revenant adrift in endless sky.
Below, the well-lit modern planes pass by,
And unaware, they brush its tentacles,
Old mooring-cables, trailing manacles
With which it trawls for aircraft as they fly.
And when it catches something in its snare,
It feasts on wires and microchips inside
While humans, just detritus flung aside,
Plunge screaming downward through the icy air.
Beware the king of airships; fear his chains.
The Hindenberg is feeding on jet planes.


Originally posted on Making Light, based on an image from Diatryma.

The ti bon ange wakes and sips its tea.
The day awaits, the curled-up sleeping man
Lies ready to inhabit, so it can
In all he does, express divinity.
In cyberspace, the greater angel stirs
And spreads its bit-fledged wings, extending far
Beyond a body's reach. The shining star
Of Coming Light unfallen, it confers
Upon its willing agents powers thus:
The well-wrought pun, the gentle quip,
The tactful hint, the jest whose pointed tip
Is yet unbarbed. And so it graces us.
O Xopher's angel twins, the great and small,
Come comment here, enlightening us all!

Written to embarrass xopher_vh on Making Light.

A single strand of silver wire entwines
Among the gems and beads, and twists around
The finest one, a secret treasure found
Among the curves like fruit among the vines.
And when the gem is lost, the shining wire
Preserves intact its shape, its outs and ins
The places where it widens, where it thins,
Reflecting, still, an echo of its fire.
How painful for the wire to now enclose
An emptiness, a hollow in its heart.
And yet the hole is just one balanced part
Of fine-wrought silverwork. And still it grows
And shapes the gulf into its graceful whole:
A necklace and a Lioness's soul.


Written for elisem, originally posted on Making Light.

The cloning table holds me half-reclined
And wraps the scanning visor round my head,
Recording me. I try to clear my mind,
But grief remains. My alter self is dead.
A roadside bomb went off; his whole squad died.
Like all the other soldiers grown before
From memories and tissue I've supplied,
He died. As will the next, and many more.
I knew that he was gone before the call—
I felt the bomb explode, and tasted blood.
I can't explain, but I've died with them all,
Been burned and shot, been stabbed and drowned in mud.
Sometimes I wish that I were just a clone
So when I die, I die just once, alone.

Originally sent to Asimov Magazine; posted on Making Light after rejection.

The branching universes take me far
Beyond my devastated world, to one
Where Earth revolves around a living star.
I find my other self. She doesn't run.
I do the thing, and hide the body well,
And then go home. The keys are in her coat.
The house is nicer here—mine's just a shell—
But on the mantelpiece, I find a note.
"If you are reading this, I must be dead.
But that's OK. I hope you made it fast.
Just know you're not the first to come instead
Of staying home. Nor will you be the last.
Enjoy this respite from whatever hell
You've just escaped, and in your turn, die well."


Originally sent to Asimov Magazine; posted on Making Light after rejection.